These SlackBuilds are intended to provide a means for a user to build and install the MATE Desktop Environment on Slackware Linux. Some of the goals of the project are:
- Do not replace any stock Slackware packages unless absolutely necessary (thus far, no packages need to be replaced);
- Keep the upstream default theme and settings;
- Try and minimize outside dependencies as much as possible; and
- Make it easy to build and install by using standard style SlackBuild scripts and slack-desc and doinst.sh files that most Slackware users have become familiar with by using the SlackBuilds repository.
The scripts are hosted in a Git repo so feel free to test and offer suggestions, improvements, patches, etc. Here are some obligatory screenshots of MATE 1.18 with its default theme and background running on Slackware64-14.2:
FAQ:
- Q: Are there binary packages?
- A: Yes, there are packages for Slackware 14.2 x86 and x86_64 available at: http://slackware.uk/msb. It is still advisable to clone the git repo and build the packages yourself but these packages are available for your convenience.
- Q: Why i don't see MATE 1.22 binary packages for Slackware 14.2?
- A: MATE 1.22 requires newer GTK+3 library that isn't available on Slackware 14.2, so MATE 1.18 is the last release that can be installed on top of Slackware 14.2. See our Supported Releases page.
- Q: How do i manage binary packages automatically?
- A: You can use slackpkg+ to manage binary packages. Please see supported repositories.
- Q: Is it possible to try out MATE in a live session for trial?
- A: Please have a look on AlienBOB's Slackware Live project that includes MATE Desktop.
- Q: Do the scripts build and run on -current?
- A: Yes, based on our testing. These scripts are developed on Slackware-current machines but binary packages will target for stable releases. Please be sure to read the README.TXT, KNOWN_ISSUES.TXT, and CURRENT.TXT documents as these are updated to note any potential problems or issues.
- Q: So -current is officially supported?
- A: Not exactly. Since Slackware -current is a moving target,
there is no guarantee that MATE SlackBuilds will build or work properly
on Slackware -current. Only a full installation of the latest
Slackware release is officially supported.
We do however tried to support -current as much as we can. Please use master branch for testing with -current. - Q: I'm getting weird issues with the panel, menu, icons, or other such things. What's up?
- A: This is rare, but if it happens, check the KNOWN_ISSUES.TXT and other docs. Usually, these kinds of issues occur when there are conflicts with other desktop environments. Backing up and moving certain directories in the user's $HOME (such as $HOME/.cache, $HOME/.config, and $HOME/.local) usually solves these issues.
- Q: How long does it take to build the packages?
- A: All the /deps, /base and /extra packages should not take too much time to build on any reasonably modern machine.
- Q: Who is behind MATE SlackBuilds?
- A: Willy Sudiarto Raharjo and Chess Griffin (Inactive). Please post bug reports at the Github repo or send us an email at mateslackbuilds@gmail.com
- Q: Are there any IRC support for MSB Project?
- A: Yes, we have created #msb channel on freenode network.
- Q: Does this site have a backup?
- A: This site's source code is hosted at GitHub and we also have secondary domain at https://mateslackbuilds.netlify.com/. Thanks to Netlify for providing us with Pro tier.
